'Tell My People Their Sins'

 

Greetings friends around the world – our friends in Egypt, Ecuador, Ethiopia, Saint George, Dominica, the Dominican Republic, and, of course, our friends in the United States of America. Welcome to the Church of Jesus Christ Online Ministries, I’m your servant Leonard V. Johnson. It’s an absolute delight to be here with you once again for this high holy day – this holy Sabbath day, also the eighth-day of God’s holy Feast of Tabernacles, the Last Great Day!

“’ CRY ALOUD, spare not; Lift up your voice like a trumpet; Tell My people their transgression, And the house of Jacob their sins.’” – Isaiah 58:1 NKJV.

So, here the LORD God is instructing the prophet Isaiah to lift up his voice like a trumpet. Now, anciently this would have probably been done at the city gates or even the temple, or perhaps the assembly of the elders – the leaders of his nation. ISRAEL was a chosen nation – and God had selected them, not because they were the greatest nation or the most powerful nation, but because they were the least of all the nations. Almighty God selected Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob/Israel, and the children of Israel were thus captured and taken to Egypt. God rescued them from the land of Egypt, brought them into the wilderness, and eventually into the Promised Land – where they truly enjoyed a wonderful bounty of a land flowing with milk and honey. And they would eventually enjoy a “golden age” under the ruler King David – becoming the most powerful, and the wealthiest of nations.

But, under King Solomon, the son of David, they had begun to spiral downward. And, the prophet Isaiah began to see this. And our LORD God inspired him to write these words and to W A R N the nation – because they had become a nation laden with iniquity.

In the 1st chapter of the Book of Isaiah, he calls the children of Israel disobedient –

Verse 2 – “Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth! For the LORD has spoken: ‘I have nourished and brought up children, And they have rebelled against Me; …’” – just like a rebellious child. My wife and I were going to adopt a fourteen-year-old boy this year. And things were going well for the first two weeks – then the “honeymoon” was over. His true colors began to show – He became belligerent, dishonest, hateful, and insolent. And, because of the restrictions on punishment, we had no recourse. What we did try, had no effect. We seriously thought about it – and decided this is not for us. And the adoption agency looked at us as if we were abandoning him – too. But, this passage here is how Almighty God is describing the children of Israel – as a disobedient, unruly, child.

What was their sin!? Well, their sin was adultery (as well as spiritual adultery; going after and worshiping false gods), blasphemy, hatred, jealousy, vanity, lust, greed, sexual immorality, perverseness, idolatry. All of these had become sins within that nation.

Verse 3 – “’ The ox knows its owner And the [ass] its master’s crib; …’” – these so-called dumb animals are not so dumb – they know who their owner is! They certainly can recognize their owner's voice. “ … ‘But Israel does not know, My people do not consider.’”

Verse 4 – “’ Alas, a sinful nation, …’”

Now, friends, just what is sin!? Well, we should know – 1st John 3:4 – “Whoever commits sin also commits lawlessness, and sin is lawlessness.” This whole world – and the nations of Israel (the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, and her Commonwealth Nations, New Zealand, Australia) respectively, appears to have lost the absolute definition of what sin is.

“ … ‘A people laden with iniquity, …’” – the modern nations of Israel have burdened themselves so much, they can’t even handle the grave burden which is upon them.

“ … ‘A brood of evildoers, Children who are corrupters! They have forsaken the LORD, They have provoked to anger The Holy One of Israel, They have turned away backward.’”

Friends, when we read this – we can easily think of the children of Israel wandering in the wilderness, and like Lot’s wife, longingly looking back to Egypt. “Have you taken us away to die in the wilderness? Why have you so dealt with us, to bring us up out of Egypt? Is this not the word that we told you in Egypt, saying, ‘Let us alone that we may serve the Egyptians? For it would have been better for us to serve the Egyptians than that we should die in the wilderness.’” – Exodus 14:11-12 NKJV. You know – there are people that have been in Jesus Christ’s Church and has since TURNED AWAY BACKWARD taking a dive straight back into the slop of pigs! Back into the filth of this world, and have completely turned their backs on Almighty God and our Lord Jesus Christ! Some had been ministers and then coming to a total meltdown of their faith – becoming staunch believers in evolution and no longer believing in the existence of God or the validity of the Holy Bible! Turning their backs on God and the beloved truth they once knew – the doctrines of Jesus Christ! And they have done like what we’re reading here – they’ve ‘turned away backward’ – the whole nation which God had chosen.

Verse 5 – “’ Why should you be stricken again? …’” – you know – as it says in Deuteronomy chapter 8, verse 5 – “’ You should know in your heart that as a man chastens his son, so the LORD your God chastens you.’” And, in Proverbs chapter 8, verse 25, “He who spares his rod hates his son, But he who loves him disciplines him promptly.” Occasionally a father has to chasten his children. And the apostle Paul was inspired by God’s Spirit to quote the Book of Proverbs – “’ For whom the LORD loves He chastens, And scourges every son whom He receives.’” – Hebrews 12:6 NKJV. God is a benevolent Father that has a great deal of love toward His people. He does not allow His people to continue on without discipline – without rules, guidelines, laws, and boundaries – to protect them. It’s like when I was five-years-old and my mother would constantly tell me, “Stay away from the light sockets!” A parent gives these boundaries to their children because they love them and want their protection.

“ … ‘You will revolt more and more. The whole head is sick, …’”

As I had mentioned to my wife just this morning – surely, deep inside one's mind they know of the absolute corruption, deception, and lies that are being perpetrated and told on our national media and from our Leftist leaders of COVID-19!? Are we so ignorant that we just believe what is being purported to us!? Or, do you have this underlying sense that corruption and lies are being reported and told and being sounded every day that goes by!? It begins to weigh heavily upon us.

“ … ‘And the whole heart faints.’” – in other words, the very spirit of the nation has become evil.

Do you recall when the LORD our God before the flood “saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually”? And “the LORD was sorry that He had made man on the earth, and He was grieved in His heart”? – cf. Genesis 6:5-6 NKJV. Now, our Lord Jesus Christ said in Matthew the 24th chapter, verse 37 – “’ But as the days of Noah were, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be. 38) For as in the days before the flood, they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, 39) and did not know until the flood came and took them all away, so also will the coming of the Son of Man be.’” Friends, it is apparent from this parable of Jesus that men and women are going to be caught wallowing in sin as they were just before the great flood.

Verse 6 – “’ From the sole of the foot even to the head, There is no soundness in it, But wounds and bruises and putrefying sores; They have not been closed or bound up, Or soothed with ointment. 7) Your country is desolate, Your cities are burned with fire; Strangers [foreigners] devour your land in your presence; And it is desolate, as overthrown by strangers [foreigners]. 8) So the daughter of Zion is left as a booth in a vineyard, As a hut in a garden of cucumbers, As a besieged city.’”

Verse 9 – “’ Unless the LORD of hosts Had left to us a very small remnant, We would have become like Sodom, We would have been made like Gomorrah.’”

Now, what the prophet Isaiah is saying here – he’s making a comparison. Do you recall when Almighty God said, “Shall I hide from Abraham what I AM doing” when the “men” were heading toward Sodom – the utter destruction of the five cities of the plain of Jordan coming soon? And, you remember Abraham’s plea!? “Suppose there were fifty righteous within the city; would You also destroy the place.” And the LORD said, “If I find in Sodom fifty, then I will spare all the place for their sakes.” And then Abraham said, “Suppose there were five less than the fifty righteous?” And then, forty, and thirty, and then twenty, and finally ten. And the LORD said, “I will not destroy it for the sake of ten righteous people.” And we know the result. Abraham’s nephew, Lot, couldn’t even convince his own family to leave. It was only his wife and his two daughters who were still living at home which left Sodom. Those five cities on the plain of Jordan were allowed to be destroyed because there weren’t even ten righteous people in that city. And, brethren, let us not sell ourselves short – but we should wonder – is it that Almighty God is holding back the utter destruction of the United States of America, the United Kingdom and her Commonwealth of Nations, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand respectively – because there are maybe ten in one-million righteous people within these nations!? It should make us wonder. Is that number depleting as time goes by!? In prayer to Almighty God and our Lord Jesus Christ the other day – a thought crossed my mind – just before the blowing of the SEVENTH TRUMP very few saints of God will be left. There will come a time when the LORD our God cannot find ten righteous people! As ‘this generation’ continues many of these cities the cup of their iniquity becomes full. And the LORD God has no choice but to exact judgment upon that nation. It is something to ponder.

Verse 10 – “’ Hear the word of the LORD, You rulers of Sodom; Give ear to the law of our God, You people of Gomorrah.” – this was God’s nation, and He’s calling this city of Jerusalem, Sodom, and Gomorrah!

And, the LORD God continues His indictment of them – about their religious ceremony. They were a very religious culture. And you can look in the nations of Israel today – there are surely two or three-thousand different dialects of religion in the United States alone, depending on whatever your taste is. You can go into any backwoods country town and find a church building on every corner! As I had mentioned before concerning Bryson City, North Carolina – I have seen it with my own eyes. We claim to be a religious nation, but we are a nation that is laden with iniquity! On the Churches-In.com website directory for so-called Christian churches in Detroit, Michigan it lists 477+ churches, with a city population of 667,272! Yet, the city of Detroit’s violent crime rate has a Neighborhood Scout ranking of 20.0 – the odds of being a victim is 1 in 50! 1

Friends, these churches must surely not be teaching – “Whoever commits sin also commits lawlessness, and sin is lawlessness AGAINST GOD!” And, look at what is in this world – its magazines, movies, television shows, in the news – the enormous homicide rate of the United States of America is 5.35 per 100k! 2 And, just last month in Chicago, a woman faces murder charges in the fatal stabbing of her 5-year-old daughter! It truly makes one sick at their stomach the iniquity which is laden upon the nations of Israel! She cut the little girl's throat and then carried her out into the street! A life is thrown away like trash! I can’t imagine what those relatives are going through! Friends, I tell you that Almighty God is looking down, and He must at times – even with tears in His eyes – truly weep at what He sees is happening with our nations.

Verse 11 – “’ To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices to Me?’ … 15) ‘When you spread out your hands, I will hide My eyes from you; Even though you make many prayers, I will not hear. Your hands are full of blood.’” – and sadly, in the very state I live, this year alone the abortion rate is 20.6 (per 1,000 women ages 14-44 years old)! 3

Verse 16 – “’ Wash yourselves, make yourselves clean; Put away the evil of your doings from before My eyes. Cease to do evil, 17) Learn to do good; Seek justice, Rebuke the oppressor; Defend the fatherless, Plead for the widow.’”

Verse 18 – “’ Come now, and let us reason together,’ Says the LORD, ‘Though your sins are like scarlet, They shall be as white as snow; Though they are red like crimson, They shall be as wool.’”

Verse 19 – “’ If you are willing and obedient, You shall eat the good of the land; 20) But if you refuse and rebel, You shall be devoured by the sword [WARFARE]’; For the mouth of the LORD has spoken.”

Almighty God warned the nation of Israel – Isaiah being the prophet to the southern tribe of Judah – and he came to see the absolute destruction of the northern tribe of Israel that would be taken away captive by the Assyrians. And, following Isaiah, the prophet Jeremiah was there to live to see the absolute destruction of the nation of Judah and seen them carried away captive.

Friends, Almighty God is going to punish the modern-day nations of Israel in the same fashion – if we, as a nation, don’t turn to Him and seek His face!

Verse 21 – “’ How the faithful city has become a harlot! It was full of justice; Righteousness lodged in it, But now murderers. 22) Your silver has become dross, Your wine mixed with water. 23) Your princes are rebellious, And companions of thieves; Everyone loves bribes, …’” – in America alone we can think of the lobbyists. Everyone wants a special interest – they want money under the table. Indeed, we can easily think about Halliburton and the Dick Cheney fiasco. Following the collapse of Saddam Hussein’s regime, Cheney’s former company, Halliburton, secured lucrative reconstruction contracts from the U.S. government, raising the specter of favoritism. As well as the former Vice President and Democratic candidate Joe Biden’s son Hunter having worked for a Ukrainian energy company – despite having had any relevant experience. Or, what about the Fort Lee lane closure scandal – in which New Jersey Governor Chris Christie colluded to create traffic jams for political reasons!? Or, as POTUS Donald Trump stated in a 2016 Twitter post, “Does anybody really believe that Bill Clinton and the U.S.A.G. talked only about “grandkids” and “golf” for 37 minutes in a plane on the tarmac?” I’ll tell you something else – throughout the past fifteen years I’ve lived in my neighborhood I’ve counted the Hernando Public Works crew come out over a dozen times to patch little potholes along residential streets – the same potholes! The inferiority of their work – the absolute “Don’t care!” attitude! And, whose paying the ticket!? The taxpayer! We’re paying for them to come back – time and time again! It is absolutely bewildering to me to see this – and to think that our great nation has stooped so low that we can’t have the quality of work that we had in the past. Like Merle Haggard sings, “Wish a Ford and a Chevy Could still last ten years like they should. Is the best of the free life behind us now? Are the good times really over for good?”

Friends, let us break this yoke of wickedness within our nation!

And, biblically speaking a good place to start – and as a nation - "Repent, and let every one of you be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit" - Acts 2:38 NKJV. And keep the TEN COMMANDMENTS!

1) You shall have no other gods before the true God.

2) You shall not make any graven image, or you shall not bow down yourself or serve these false gods.

Now, those are sort of rather related, it’s simply put – You will not follow and serve false teachers, false ministers, which promote the false gods and false religions. The first two commandments clearly state that there should be NOTHING in our lives which is more important to us than loving, obeying, and serving Almighty God, and that includes parents, mates, children, brother’s, sister’s, family, friends, nation, home, job, career, political party or affiliation – NOTHING – GOD IS TO BE NUMBER ONE!

3) You shall not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain.

4) Well, number four is why we’re here today. ‘Remember the Sabbath day [and that means the seventh day; not the first day].’ And by extension, it means obeying and keeping the annual Sabbath’s or annual Holy Days.

5) ‘Honor thy father and thy mother.’ And it goes on to add that your days may be long upon the earth.

6) ‘Thou shalt not kill.’ Or, as you get the whole proper translation, ‘Thou shall do no murder.’ And I cannot read or think of this verse without grieving. I’ve mentioned this before, but I just think this is a major issue when God looks down upon this country and its society. I, and many of us, grieve for the 61,628,584 Babies Which Have Been Killed in Abortions Since Roe v. Wade in 1973! They were MURDERED! Now, that was 47-years ago! Consider the number of children that never had the opportunity to exist because their potential parents never had a chance to be born, grow up, and have children, and families of their own! We are possibly looking at the number 100 MILLION Americans who are missing from our ranks because they were never allowed to be born and their children were never allowed to be born. A hundred million people! The pro-choice movement – as they like to call themselves – is badly mislabeled in my opinion. If people who are for life are called pro-life, then I think people who are for abortion should be labeled pro-death. Let’s just be honest here. That’s what they're for – they want to see babies murdered. And I know that’s not a nice way to put it, and it’s not really politically correct, not flowery. But it’s the truth! They’re wanting to kill people who are simply and totally and completely innocent.

Also, our nation is facing a major financial crisis with a national debt of well over $27 TRILLION! And being able to fund services like Social Security and Medicare - and a lot of people rely upon those – the problem is rather simple to understand.

7) ‘Thou shalt not commit adultery.’ And, in its basic form, the explanation of this commandment is rather straightforward and easy to understand. It speaks for itself. But why did God include this in His big ten!? Why this issue!? Well if a man or a woman pledge their devotion and their fidelity to their mate and then they break that pledge, that promise, that commitment, can God Almighty and Jesus Christ have any confidence that the same person who has pledged their devotion and fidelity to Them has any validity!? If you cannot be loyal to your mate whom you have seen, how can you be loyal to God whom you have not seen!? To paraphrase an idea.

8) ‘Thou shalt not steal.’ That’s rather simple, straightforward. You can’t take what isn’t yours!

9) ‘Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor.’ Just the Words of God, ‘Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor.’

10) ‘Thou shalt not covet.’ The eventual offspring of covetousness or lust is sin. And death is the offspring of sin. James 1 says, ‘each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own desires, and enticed. 15) Then, when desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; …” – sin doesn’t start out as sin. Sin starts as a thought, as an emotion, as a desire. And at that point we have the opportunity to say, “Get out of here!” Or, we have the opportunity to entertain it. And once we entertain it, we go down into the area of sin, and as James said, “and sin, when it is full-grown [finished], brings forth death.”

We can demonstrate our love for Jesus Christ by manifesting concern, caring, love, respect, kindness, for our fellow human beings. Notice what Jesus had to say in Matthew 25 – I could read the whole passage, but I’ll just get to the punch line. This is a major teaching point. Verse 40 – “…’ Assuredly, I say to you, inasmuch as you did it [a good thing] to one of the least of these My brethren, you did it to Me.’” I’ll say it again, ‘Inasmuch as you have done one of these kind acts, unto one of the least important people in the Church, you’ve done it unto Me.’ So, we’re right back to the second of those two great commandments.

‘You will love your neighbor as yourself.’ How do you show love for God!? Love your fellow human being - your neighbors as yourself. In short, do unto others as you would have them to do unto you. The golden rule. And friends, I just spoke of this very thing in the article “You’re Not Welcome Here!”

That’s what it’s all about. What a simple idea – this my friends is a great KEY to eternal life! □

Bibliography:

1 Lucas, F. America’s Top 20 Cities for Crime, and What Party Runs Them, The Daily Signal, 24 June 2020. https://www.dailysignal.com/2020/06/24/americas-top-20-cities-for-crime-and-what-party-runs-them. Retrieved 29 September 2020.

2 Murder Rate By Country 2020. World Population Review. https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/murder-rate-by-country. Retrieved 29 September 2020.

3 Abortion Rate By State 2020. World Population Review. https://worldpopulationreview.com/state-rankings/abortion-rates-by-state. Retrieved 29 September 2020.